Doctors Haven`t Decided If Hawkins Needs Surgery

April 6, 1986|By Ken Cummins, Washington Bureau

Six days after Sen. Paula Hawkins re-entered Duke University Medical Center for possible spinal surgery, her surgeons still have not determined whether an operation will be needed to relieve the chronic pain resulting from a four- year-old neck injury.

Late Saturday afternoon, Hawkins` doctors took another CAT scan X-ray of her lower spine, the second CAT scan of the senator`s spine and neck during the last two days.

Hawkins` spokesman, Bill Hart, said her doctors would review the results of the second CAT scan sometime today to try to reach a decision on whether an operation would reduce or eliminate the constant pain Hawkins, R-Fla., says she has endured since suffering the neck injury in a 1982 accident in an Orlando television studio.

``There are no secrets we are keeping from the press,`` Hart said late Saturday evening. ``They (Hawkins` doctors) have not gotten down to the business of saying there is going to be an operation.``

Hart said the senator was examined by at least three different physicians Saturday.

Hawkins also was given a myelogram X-ray Friday morning, during which dye was injected into her spinal column to highlight the damaged areas. The senator`s surgeon, Dr. Blaine S. Nashold Jr., previously had described the myelogram as the main test to decide whether surgery was needed. But Nashold subsequently ordered the two CAT scans after Friday`s myelogram was taken.

Hart said that if an operation is required, it will not be scheduled before sometime Monday at the earliest.